East Germany begins construction of the Berlin Wall - Aug 12, 1961 - HISTORY.com East Germany begins construction of the Berlin Wall Share this: East Germany begins construction of the Berlin Wall Author East Germany begins construction of the Berlin Wall URL Publisher A+E Networks In an effort to stem the tide of refugees attempting to leave East Berlin, the communist government of East Germany begins building the Berlin Wall to divide East and West Berlin. Construction of the wall caused a short-term crisis in U.S.-Soviet bloc relations, and the wall itself came to symbolize the Cold War. Throughout the 1950s and into the early 1960s, thousands of people from East Berlin crossed over into West Berlin to reunite with families and escape communist repression. In an effort to stop that outflow, the government of East Germany, on the night of August 12, 1961, began to seal off all points of entrance into West Berlin from East Berlin by stringing barbed wire and posting sentries. In the days and weeks to come, construction of a concrete block wall began, complete with sentry towers and minefields around it. The Berlin Wall succeeded in completely sealing off the two sections of Berlin.

The U.S. government responded angrily. Commanders of U.S. troops in West Berlin even began to make plans to bulldoze the wall, but gave up on the idea when the Soviets moved armored units into position to protect it. The West German government was furious with America’s lack of action, but President John F. Kennedy believed that “A wall is a hell of a lot better than a war.” In an attempt to reassure the West Germans that the United States was not abandoning them, Kennedy traveled to the Berlin Wall in June 1963, and famously declared, “Ich bin ein Berliner!” (“I am a Berliner!”). Since the word “Berliner” was commonly referred to as a jelly doughnut throughout most of Germany, Kennedy’s improper use of German grammar was also translated as “I am a jelly doughnut.” However, due to the context of his speech, Kennedy’s intended meaning that he stood together with West Berlin in its rivalry with communist East Berlin and the German Democratic Republic was understood by the German people. In the years to come, the Berlin Wall became a physical symbol of the Cold War.

The stark division between communist East Berlin and democratic West Berlin served as the subject for numerous editorials and speeches in the United States, while the Soviet bloc characterized the wall as a necessary protection against the degrading and immoral influences of decadent Western culture and capitalism. During the lifetime of the wall, nearly 80 people were killed trying to escape from East to West Berlin. In late 1989, with communist governments falling throughout Eastern Europe, the Berlin Wall was finally opened and then demolished. For many observers, this action was the signal that the Cold War was finally coming to an end. Related Videos The Berlin Wall The Berlin Wall The mounting tensions between the Allies and Soviets culminated in the Berlin Crisis and the construction of the Berlin Wall. The Berlin Wall During the early years of the Cold War, West Berlin was a geographical loophole through which thousands of East Germans fled to the democratic West. In response, the Communist East German authorities built a wall that totally encircled West Berlin. It was thrown up overnight, on 13 August 1961. For the next three decades, the city became the hot end of the Cold War as the world's nuclear superpowers faced off across the Wall.

Half a century later, we look back on the Wall and its impact through a BBC archive collection. Photo: West Berliners gather at the Wall whilst an East German soldier patrols the other side, in August 1961. (Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images) More information about: The Berlin Wall The Berlin Wall (German: Berliner Mauer) was a barrier that divided Berlin from 1961 to 1989. Constructed by the German Democratic Republic (GDR, East Germany), starting on 13 August 1961, the Wall completely cut off (by land) West Berlin from surrounding East Germany and from East Berlin until government officials opened it in November 1989. Its demolition officially began on 13 June 1990 and was completed in 1992. The barrier included guard towers placed along large concrete walls, which circumscribed a wide area (later known as the "death strip") that contained anti-vehicle trenches, "fakir beds" and other defenses. The Eastern Bloc claimed that the Wall was erected to protect its population from fascist elements conspiring to prevent the "will of the people" in building a socialist state in East Germany.

In practice, the Wall served to prevent the massive emigration and defection that had marked East Germany and the communist Eastern Bloc during the post-World War II period. The Berlin Wall was officially referred to as the "Anti-Fascist Protective Wall" (German: Antifaschistischer Schutzwall) by GDR authorities, implying that the NATO countries and West Germany in particular were considered equal to "fascists" by GDR propaganda. The West Berlin city government sometimes referred to it as the "Wall of Shame"—a term coined by mayor Willy Brandt—while condemning the Wall's restriction on freedom of movement. Along with the separate and much longer Inner German border (IGB), which demarcated the border between East and West Germany, it came to symbolize a physical marker of the "Iron Curtain" that separated Western Europe and the Eastern Bloc during the Cold War. Before the Wall's erection, 3.5 million East Germans circumvented Eastern Bloc emigration restrictions and defected from the GDR, many by crossing over the border from East Berlin into West Berlin; from which they could then travel to West Germany and other Western European countries.

Between 1961 and 1989, the Wall prevented almost all such emigration. During this period, around 5,000 people attempted to escape over the Wall, with an estimated death toll ranging from 136 to more than 200 in and around Berlin. In 1989, a series of radical political changes occurred in the Eastern Bloc, associated with the liberalization of the Eastern Bloc's authoritarian systems and the erosion of political power in the pro-Soviet governments in nearby Poland and Hungary. After several weeks of civil unrest, the East German government announced on 9 November 1989 that all GDR citizens could visit West Germany and West Berlin. Crowds of East Germans crossed and climbed onto the Wall, joined by West Germans on the other side in a celebratory atmosphere. Over the next few weeks, euphoric people and souvenir hunters chipped away parts of the Wall; the governments later used industrial equipment to remove most of what was left. Contrary to popular belief the Wall's actual demolition did not begin until the summer of 1990 and was not completed until 1992.

The fall of the Berlin Wall paved the way for German reunification, which was formally concluded on 3 October 1990. Berlin Wall: 50 years since construction of the wall began - Telegraph World news Berlin Wall: 50 years since construction of the wall began Fifty years ago, on August 13 1961, the wall was erected in haste across the heart of a divided Germany's former capital, instantly becoming the starkest Cold War symbol of the Iron Curtain between the free West and Communist, totalitarian East. The sudden and speedy construction of the East-West barrier caught many Berliners by surprise, including those who were killed as they tried to circumvent the wall as it rose. Picture: AP Berlin Wall - Cold War - HISTORY.com Berlin Wall A+E Networks Introduction On August 13, 1961, the Communist government of the German Democratic Republic (GDR, or East Germany) began to build a barbed wire and concrete “Antifascistischer Schutzwall,” or “antifascist bulwark,” between East and West Berlin.

The official purpose of this Berlin Wall was to keep Western “fascists” from entering East Germany and undermining the socialist state, but it primarily served the objective of stemming mass defections from East to West. The Berlin Wall stood until November 9, 1989, when the head of the East German Communist Party announced that citizens of the GDR could cross the border whenever they pleased. That night, ecstatic crowds swarmed the wall. Some crossed freely into West Berlin, while others brought hammers and picks and began to chip away at the wall itself. To this day, the Berlin Wall remains one of the most powerful and enduring symbols of the Cold War. Google The Berlin Wall: The Partitioning of Berlin As World War II came to an end in 1945, a pair of Allied peace conferences at Yalta and Potsdam determined the fate of Germany’s territories. They split the defeated nation into four “allied occupation zones”: The eastern part of the country went to the Soviet Union, while the western part went to the United States, Great Britain and (eventually) France. Did You Know?

On October 22, 1961, a quarrel between an East German border guard and an American official on his way to the opera in East Berlin very nearly led to what one observer called "a nuclear-age equivalent of the Wild West Showdown at the O.K. Corral." That day, American and Soviet tanks faced off at Checkpoint Charlie for 16 hours. Photographs of the confrontation are some of the most familiar and memorable images of the Cold War. Even though Berlin was located entirely within the Soviet part of the country (it sat about 100 miles from the border between the eastern and western occupation zones), the Yalta and Potsdam agreements split the city into similar sectors. The Soviets took the eastern half, while the other Allies took the western. This four-way occupation of Berlin began in June 1945. The Berlin Wall: Blockade and Crisis The existence of West Berlin, a conspicuously capitalist city deep within communist East Germany, “stuck like a bone in the Soviet throat,” as Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev put it. The Russians began maneuvering to drive the United States, Britain and France out of the city for good.

In 1948, a Soviet blockade of West Berlin aimed to starve the western Allies out of the city. Instead of retreating, however, the United States and its allies supplied their sectors of the city from the air. This effort, known as the Berlin Airlift , lasted for more than a year and delivered more than 2.3 million tons of food, fuel and other goods to West Berlin. The Soviets called off the blockade in 1949. After a decade of relative calm, tensions flared again in 1958. For the next three years, the Soviets–emboldened by the successful launch of the Sputnik satellite the year before and embarrassed by the seemingly endless flow of refugees from east to west (nearly 3 million since the end of the blockade, many of them young skilled workers such as doctors, teachers and engineers)–blustered and made threats, while the Allies resisted. Summits, conferences and other negotiations came and went without resolution. Meanwhile, the flood of refugees continued. In June 1961, some 19,000 people left the GDR through Berlin. The following month, 30,000 fled.

In the first 11 days of August, 16,000 East Germans crossed the border into West Berlin, and on August 12 some 2,400 followed—the largest number of defectors ever to leave East Germany in a single day. The Berlin Wall: Building the Wall That night, Premier Khrushchev gave the East German government permission to stop the flow of emigrants by closing its border for good. In just two weeks, the East German army, police force and volunteer construction workers had completed a makeshift barbed wire and concrete block wall–the Berlin Wall–that divided one side of the city from the other. Before the wall was built, Berliners on both sides of the city could move around fairly freely: They crossed the East-West border to work, to shop, to go to the theater and the movies. Trains and subway lines carried passengers back and forth. After the wall was built, it became impossible to get from East to West Berlin except through one of three checkpoints: at Helmstedt (“Checkpoint Alpha” in American military parlance), at Dreilinden (“Checkpoint Bravo”) and in the center of Berlin at Friedrichstrasse (“Checkpoint Charlie”).

(Eventually, the GDR built 12 checkpoints along the wall.) At each of the checkpoints, East German soldiers screened diplomats and other officials before they were allowed to enter or leave. Except under special circumstances, travelers from East and West Berlin were rarely allowed across the border. The Berlin Wall: 1961-1989 The construction of the Berlin Wall did stop the flood of refugees from East to West, and it did defuse the crisis over Berlin. (Though he was not happy about it, President Kennedy conceded that “a wall is a hell of a lot better than a war.”) Over time, East German officials replaced the makeshift wall with one that was sturdier and more difficult to scale. A 12-foot-tall, 4-foot-wide mass of reinforced concrete was topped with an enormous pipe that made climbing over nearly impossible. Behind the wall on the East German side was a so-called “Death Strip”: a gauntlet of soft sand (to show footprints), floodlights, vicious dogs, trip-wire machine guns and patrolling soldiers with orders to shoot escapees on sight. In all, at least 171 people were killed trying to get over, under or around the Berlin Wall.

Escape from East Germany was not impossible, however: From 1961 until the wall came down in 1989, more than 5,000 East Germans (including some 600 border guards) managed to cross the border by jumping out of windows adjacent to the wall, climbing over the barbed wire, flying in hot air balloons, crawling through the sewers and driving through unfortified parts of the wall at high speeds. The Berlin Wall: The Fall of the Wall On November 9, 1989, as the Cold War began to thaw across Eastern Europe, the spokesman for East Berlin’s Communist Party announced a change in his city’s relations with the West. Starting at midnight that day, he said, citizens of the GDR were free to cross the country’s borders. East and West Berliners flocked to the wall, drinking beer and champagne and chanting “Tor auf!” (“Open the gate!”). At midnight, they flooded through the checkpoints.

More than 2 million people from East Berlin visited West Berlin that weekend to participate in a celebration that was, one journalist wrote, “the greatest street party in the history of the world.” People used hammers and picks to knock away chunks of the wall–they became known as “mauerspechte,” or “wall woodpeckers”—while cranes and bulldozers pulled down section after section. Soon the wall was gone and Berlin was united for the first time since 1945. “Only today,” one Berliner spray-painted on a piece of the wall, “is the war really over.” The reunification of East and West Germany was made official on October 3, 1990, almost one year after the fall of the Berlin Wall. Tags Berlin Wall Berlin Wall Introduction In post- World War II Germany, the Berlin Wall was erected on August 16, 1961, along the demarcation between the eastern sector of Berlin controlled by the Soviet Union, and the western sectors occupied by the United States, France, and Great Britain.

East Germany, officially the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was a Communist state that existed from 1949 to 1990 in the former Soviet occupation zone of Germany. The Soviet sector was by far the largest and covered most of east Berlin, including Friedrichshain, Kreuzberg, Mitte, Prenzlauer Berg, Kreuzberg, and Lichtenberg. Its twofold purpose was to prevent well-educated East Germans from leaving East Germany ï¿½ a "brain drain" ï¿½ and to impede approximately 80 spy centers and organizations from interfering with the Russian sector. The threat of a second Great Depression loomed large in Europe, and Germany was one of the hardest-hit areas. Most German cities had been all but obliterated, and transportation systems lay in ruins. Routinely, refugees fled from East to West in search of a society sound enough for them to work for the barest daily essentials. In a rare move, the Allied victors decided to allay an economic crisis by helping to rebuild the most-devastated areas as quickly as possible. That effort was called the Marshall Plan , in honor of George C. Marshall , then U.S.

Secretary of State, who first called for Allied participation in the restoration of Europe. The success of that strategy earned Marshall a Nobel Peace Prize . The " Berlin Crisis " involved a controversy so bitter and so sustained that at its height, world leaders feared that a misstep could trigger a nuclear war. The crisis unfolded through a war of words, diplomatic negotiations, superpower summits, and military posturing and preparations , ï¿½ thus the term " Cold War " ï¿½ as East and West disputed over Berlin`s future. For presidents Eisenhower and Kennedy , U.S. credibility was at stake: A failure in Berlin could disrupt NATO and weaken American influence in West Germany, the key to the balance of power in Europe. The Berlin Wall was the flashpoint of the Berlin Crisis. The Berlin Crisis was a flashpoint of the Cold War. The Iron Curtain descends Berlin was considered to be the key to the balance of power in post- World War II Europe. The postwar, sequestered Soviet Union, was nevertheless active beyond its borders. Events around the world, many seemingly unrelated, represented battlefronts in the Cold War. Some battlefronts were hidden from public view for decades.

Other battlefronts, like the Berlin Crisis, were highly public. The Berlin Crisis started with the 1948 Berlin blockade ordered by Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev , which led to the Berlin Airlift by the Western Allies. Cold War tensions continued to smolder for four decades after the World War II defeat of Germany. The construction and destruction of the Berlin Wall stand as milestones of the Cold War era. In July 1958, the East German Fifth Congress ordered a wholesale collectivization of agriculture and a sharp rise in industrial output. That was part of a seven-year economic plan to bring per capita consumption in the GDR up to the level of West Germany. The plan also repressed private trade and created supply gaps behind the Iron Curtain, which became increasingly severe and oppressive. Dissatisfaction by an increasing number of people in the GDR caused them to seek refuge in the West ï¿½ a major loophole in the GDR scheme of things. The border to West Berlin lay open to East Germans, and hundreds left the country daily. Nearly all of them went by subway or S-Bahn (electric commuter train), undetected among the thousands of commuters who worked or shopped in the West.

Regular spot checks by the police on anyone carrying a suitcase exerted little impact. Most people easily evaded them by making repeated journeys with a few belongings at a time. At an international press conference on June 15, 1961, the leader of the east German Socialist Unity Part of Germany (SED) and president of the Privy Council, Walter Ulbricht, answered a journalist`s question: "I understand your question as follows: There are people in West Germany who want us to mobilize the construction workers of the GDR to build a wall. I am not aware of any such plans ... No one has the intention of constructing a wall." But the wall was exactly what he wanted from Khruschev. The international political situation between NATO and Warsaw Pact nations continued to intensify. On November 27, 1958, the Soviets under Khrushchev delivered the Berlin Ultimatum in an attempt to stem the tide of refugees. The ultimatum demanded that the western allies withdraw their troops from West Berlin and that it should become a "free city" within six months.

The threat of a separate peace treaty between the Soviet Union and East Germany loomed on February 17, 1959. A meeting in Vienna between President Kennedy and Premier Khrushchev on June 3 and 4, 1961, failed to end the impasse. The ultimatum was a fiasco, and the situation was even worse than before. Continued tension during the six-month period had only increased the flow of refugees who feared that time was running short. When the ultimatum ran out, there was a brief respite. But as the effects of the "Seven-Year Plan" began to be felt, the flow of refugees rose again. Construction of the Berlin Wall The Berlin Wall was erected on August 13, 1961. Early on that Sunday morning the GDR began, under Secretary General Erich Honecker, to block off East Berlin and the GDR from West Berlin by means of barbed wire and antitank obstacles. Streets were torn up, and barricades of paving stones were erected. Tanks gathered at crucial places. The subway and local railway services between East and West Berlin were interrupted.

Inhabitants of East Berlin and the GDR were no longer allowed to enter West Berlin, amongst them 60,000 commuters who had worked in West Berlin. In the following days, construction brigades commenced to replace the provisional barriers with a solid wall. Thousands of angry demonstrators quickly gathered on the West Berlin side of the divide. At one crossing point, protesters tried to trample down the barbed wire, only to be driven back by guards with bayonets. The West German chancellor, Konrad Adenauer, appealed for calm, saying in a broadcast to the nation the following evening: "Now, as always, we are closely bound to the Germans of the Russian zone and East Berlin. "They are and remain our German brothers and sisters. The Federal Government remains firmly committed to the goal of German unity." Outrage from the international community erupted at the abrupt decision to cut off one side of the city from the other. A Foreign Office spokesman in London said the restrictions were contrary to the four-power status of Berlin, and therefore illegal. The American secretary of state, Dean Rusk, called it a "flagrant violation" of East-West agreements, and said there would be a vigorous protest to Russia.

Yet, the reaction of the Allies was moderate, given that the three essentials of American policy regarding Berlin were not affected: the presence of allied troops, free access to Berlin, and the West Berliners` right of self-determination. After August 23, 1961, citizens of West Berlin were no longer allowed to enter East Berlin. On September 20, the forced evacuation of houses situated immediately at the border to West Berlin began. On August 17, 1962, Peter Fechter, an 18-year-old citizen of East Berlin, bled to death after he was shot down by a East Berlin border patrol in his attempt to escape over the wall. The last to die was Chris Gueffroy on June 2, 1989. Many attempted to escape over the 28 years of the wall`s existence. First, there was a wall that comprised concrete segments with a height of about about 13 feet, usually with a concrete tube on top of it. Behind it on the east side lay an illuminated control area ï¿½ also called the "death area." Refugees who had reached that area were shot without warning.

A trench that followed was intended to prevent vehicles from breaking through. Then there was a patrol track, a corridor with watchdogs, watchtowers and bunkers, and a second wall. The barrier cut through 192 streets (97 between East and West Berlin and 95 between West Berlin and East Germany), 32 railway lines, eight S-Bahns, and four underground train lines, three autobahns (freeways), and several rivers and lakes. On the waterways, the wall consisted of submerged railings under constant surveillance by patrol boat crews. The total length of the Berlin Wall was 96 miles. Twenty-seven miles went through the center of the city. Twenty-three miles went through residential areas. Sixty-six miles comprised a concrete barrier 13 feet high. It also consisted of 302 watch towers and 20 bunkers. More than 5,000 people successfully crossed the Berlin Wall to freedom. About 3,200 people were arrested in the border area. More than 160 people were killed in the death area, and another 120 people were injured.

Due to the danger of escape attempts over the wall, numerous tunnels were dug, allowing about 150 East Berliners to escape undetected. As time passed, the wall was gradually perfected and became more impassible. After October 1964, it was gradually strengthened, doubled up and transformed into a "modern border," which assumed its final appearance from 1979 to 1980. The partition left West Berlin stranded in the midst of the Soviet zone, 110 miles from the border with the western zones. That unusual geopolitical situation became difficult to handle. On June 26, 1963, President John F. Kennedy delivered a historic speech in Rudolph Wilde Square in Berlin. The square was packed with cheering West Berliners. It was a spectacle new to Kennedy ï¿½ one to two million people assembled to greet him. In the midst of the Cold War he declared, ï¿½There are many people in the world who really donï¿½t understand, or say they donï¿½t, what is the great issue between the free world and the communist world.

Let them come to Berlin." President Kennedy, identifying with the citizens of Berlin in their quest for freedom and to be reunited with their families in East Berlin, said, ï¿½Ich bin ein Berliner." (ï¿½I am a Berliner"). The Iron Curtain begins to ascend President Ronald Reagan delivered a speech at the Brandenburg Gate in West Berlin on June 12, 1987. His comments were to the people of West Berlin, but audible on the East side of the Berlin Wall. Part of Reagan`s intended audience was none other than Mikhail Gorbachev : "There is one sign the Soviets can make that would be unmistakable, that would advance dramatically the cause of freedom and peace. General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall! The Iron Curtain began to rise when the wall met its demise. Soon afterward, Gorbachev made his first official visit to West Germany in May 1989.

While there, he announced that Moscow would no longer forcefully prevent democratic conversion of its outlying states. Hungary opened its border with Austria on September 11, 1989. The opening of the borders between East and West Berlin, which also symbolized the end of the Cold War , began on June 13, 1990. Reconstruction of Berlin Since the Berlin Wall became obsolete with the 1989 opening of the borders between East and West Germany, Berliners have created massive reconstruction, mostly in what was East Berlin. The heart of the city, the Mitte district, was rebuilt, though remnants of the communist regime still remain. The 19th-century Reichstag building, the new seat of the German parliament, gained a modern glass cupola to replace the original dome destroyed by fire when the Nazis came to power. A museum at the former site of Checkpoint Charlie, the famous border post in the American sector, memorializes the Berlin Wall. The greatest reconstruction has been the reconnection of a people ï¿½ reconstruction of strained relationships and cultures, not just in Germany, but across Eurasia.

The terms Perestroika and Glasnost, Russian for restructuring and openness respectively, were used to describe the set of reforms instituted by Mikhail Gorbachev in the late 1980s. The terms also could be used to describe the end of the Cold War. ---- Selected Quotes ---- Building the Berlin Wall | BBC World Service Wednesday 15 August, 2001 Building the Berlin Wall One summer morning in 1961, Berliners awoke to a makeshift barricade separating the two sides of the city. The first barbed wire fences were rapidly followed by even more sinister concrete structures, isolating Berlin’s symbol, The Brandenberg Gate. To coincide with the 40th anniversary of the building of the Berlin Wall, Outlook talks to Christopher Hilton, author of a new book that brings together the personal testimonies of people who have strong memories of those divided days. Wall of secrecy After World War II, West Berlin was an island behind the Iron Curtain, a besieged outpost of the western powers. East Berliners began to move to West Berlin in their droves. In fact before the construction of the Wall, an estimated 2,000 people a week were moving from East to West.

The authorities knew that they had to do something to stop the exodus as East Berlin was, quite literally, ebbing away. But nobody could have dreamt of what was to happen. As Christopher Hilton describes in his book, The Wall: ‘Not a single Berliner heard the faintest whisper of a rumour, not a word of warning.’ Putting up barriers The building of a barrier between East and West happened in the dead of night and was shrouded in total secrecy. Just two days before the barrier was erected 1,500 refugees had moved to West Berlin. The East could not contain its people and it had to stop. In the early hours of 13th August 1961 a barrier was put in place, essentially imprisoning a community of 17 million people. One former East Berliner told Hilton of how he watched on television the first pictures of the troops at the border: ‘It was genuinely incredible because all the streets were divided right through the city. Try to think of that happening in New York, London or Paris.' 'The men in uniform looked pretty grim.

We wondered what was happening and we were scared.’ Erdmure Gries-Behrend was working for Reuters news agency on the day the first barricades appeared. To listen to her recollection of the event, please click here. Disbelief Watchtowers punctuated the city limits and the temporary barbed wire constructions were soon replaced with concrete. Within a year the Wall was seven and half miles long and fences stretched the remaining 91.7 miles around the city. It bisected the nation, dividing streets, fields and families, but as Hilton describes, the people could not believe that the Wall was for real. How could any government capture an entire city by building a 12ft wall and expect to get away with it? ‘There was a feeling of, well they put this wall up to stabilise the situation, but once they have stabilised it they will take down and we will have a sort of normality again.’ ‘There was also feeling of anger and disbelief. And a feeling that the Americans will never tolerate this – the Americans will come.’ Wall or war But the Americans didn’t come. In Hilton’s view any intervention by the West would have been a ‘symbolic gesture’.

He explains: ‘We were living in a nuclear age. Bear in mind that Berlin is 130 kilometres behind the Iron Curtain, it had half a million soviet soldiers around it, the whole East German army. Against that there were 12,000 Americans, 4,000 British soldiers and about 3-4,000 French soldiers.’ ‘The Russians would have certainly have crushed West Berlin. We would then have had to respond to that and we would have had a nuclear escalation that Kennedy dreaded.’ As Berliners reeled with disbelief at the Wall's construction, US President John F Kennedy has been quoted as saying to one of his aides: ‘It’s not a nice solution, but a wall is a lot better than a war.’ Escape The Wall was there to stay and it soon became apparent that the division of East and West Germany was permanent and non-negotiable. Life continued on either side but the differences were stark. As Hilton explains: ‘The Wall acquired a logic of its own. Living standards between the two halves of Germany were 30 years apart.’ Those who tried to cross from East to West paid with their lives.

Whilst it is impossible to estimate how many people attempted to flee, Hilton’s book pays homage to the 163 men and women who are known to have died whilst attempting to escape. Scattered throughout his book are quotes from the East German authority's reports on each death; brief reports that Hilton refers to as ‘tombstones.’ Dennis Bark was a 20-year-old American student. On 17th August 1962 he and his brother decided to go over to East Berlin. They were quickly sent back by armed police. Click here to listen to his experience. Freedom For the majority of Berliners segregated life continued and during the next 28 years, the Berlin Wall became the most infamous political barrier in the world. Then on 9 November 1989, five days after the East German Government resigned, thousands of East Germans breached the Wall and attempted to pull it down, brick by brick. When they finally broke through there was an enormous sense of freedom. East and West Berliners embraced as a sense of euphoria and hope for the future swept across a nation reunited. Further reading The Berlin Wall - Symbol of the Cold War Updated February 15, 2016. What Was the Berlin Wall?

Erected in the dead of night on August 13, 1961, the Berlin Wall (known as Berliner Mauer in German) was a physical division between West Berlin and East Germany in order to keep East Germans from feeling to the West. When the Berlin Wall fell on November 9, 1989, its destruction was nearly as instantaneous as its creation. For 28 years, the Berlin Wall had been a symbol of the Cold War and thus when it fell it was celebrated around the world. A Divided Berlin At the end of World War II , the Allied powers divided conquered Germany into four zones, each occupied by either the United States, Great Britain, France, or the Soviet Union (as agreed at the Potsdam Conference ). The same was done with Germany's capital city, Berlin. As the relationship between the Soviet Union and the other three Allied powers quickly disintegrated, the cooperative atmosphere of the occupation of Germany turned competitive and aggressive. Although an eventual reunification of Germany had been intended, the new relationship between the Allied powers turned Germany into West versus East, democracy versus Communism .

continue reading below our video Overview: The Berlin Wall In 1949, this new organization of Germany became official when the three zones occupied by the United States, Great Britain, and France combined to form West Germany (the Federal Republic of Germany). The zone occupied by the Soviet Union quickly followed by forming East Germany (the German Democratic Republic). This same division into West and East occurred in Berlin. Since the city of Berlin had been situated entirely within the Soviet zone of occupation, West Berlin became an island of democracy within Communist East Germany. Mass Emigration Within a short period of time after the war, living conditions in West Germany and East Germany became distinctly different. With the help and support of its occupying powers, West Germany set up a capitalist society and experienced such a rapid growth of their economy that it became known as the "economic miracle." With hard work, individuals living in West Germany were able to live well, buy gadgets and appliances, and to travel as they wished. Nearly the opposite was true in East Germany. Since the Soviet Union had viewed their zone as a spoil of war, the Soviets pilfered factory equipment and other valuable assets from their zone and shipped them back to the Soviet Union.

When East Germany became its own country, it was under the direct influence of the Soviet Union and thus a Communist society was established. In East Germany, the economy dragged and individual freedoms were severely restricted. By the late 1950s, many people living in East Germany wanted out. No longer able to stand the repressive living conditions of East Germany, they would pack up their bags and head to West Berlin. Although some of them would be stopped on their way, hundreds of thousands of others made it across the border. Once across, these refugees were housed in warehouses and then flown to West Germany. Many of those who escaped were young, trained professionals. By the early 1960s, East Germany was rapidly losing both its labor force and its population. Having already lost 2.5 million people by 1961, East Germany desperately needed to stop this mass exodus. The obvious leak was the easy access East Germans had to West Berlin. With the support of the Soviet Union, there had been several attempts to simply take over West Berlin in order to eliminate this exit point.

Although the Soviet Union even threatened the United States with the use of nuclear weapons over this issue, the United States and other Western countries were committed to defending West Berlin. Desperate to keep its citizens, East Germany decided to build a wall to prevent them from crossing the border. The Berlin Wall Goes Up There had been rumors that something might happen to tighten the border of East and West Berlin, but no one was expecting the speed nor the absoluteness of the Berlin Wall. Just past midnight on the night of August 12-13, 1961, trucks with soldiers and construction workers rumbled through East Berlin. While most Berliners were sleeping, these crews began tearing up streets that entered into West Berlin, dug holes to put up concrete posts, and strung barbed wire all across the border between East and West Berlin. Telephone wires between East and West Berlin were also cut. Berliners were shocked when they woke up that morning. What had once been a very fluid border was now rigid. No longer could East Berliners cross the border for operas, plays, soccer games, etc. No longer could the approximately 60,000 commuters head to West Berlin for well-paying jobs.

No longer could families, friends, and lovers cross the border to meet their loved ones. Whichever side of the border one went to sleep on during the night of August 12, they were stuck on that side for decades. The Size and Scope of the Berlin Wall The Berlin Wall stretched over a hundred miles. It ran not only through the center of Berlin, but also wrapped around West Berlin, entirely cutting West Berlin off from the rest of East Germany. The wall itself went through four major transformations during its 28-year history. The Berlin Wall started out as a barbed-wire fence with concrete posts, but just a few days after the first fence was placed, it was quickly replaced with a sturdier, more permanent structure made out of concrete blocks, topped with barbed wire. The first two versions of the wall (barbed wire and concrete blocks) were replaced by the third version of the Berlin Wall in 1965. This version consisted of a concrete wall, supported by steel girders. The fourth version of the Berlin Wall, constructed from 1975 to 1980, was the most complicated and thorough.

It consisted of concrete slabs reaching nearly 12-feet high (3.6 m) and 4-feet wide (1.2 m), plus it had a smooth pipe running across the top to hinder people from scaling the Wall. By the time the Berlin Wall fell in 1989, there was a 300-foot No Man's Land, an additional inner wall, soldiers patrolling with dogs, a raked ground that showed footprints, anti-vehicle trenches, electric fences, massive light systems, watchtowers, bunkers, and minefields. Checkpoints Although most of the border between East and West consisted of layers of preventative measures, there were little more than a handful of official openings along the Berlin Wall. These openings, called checkpoints, were for the infrequent use of officials and others with special permission to cross the border. The most famous of these was Checkpoint Charlie , located on the border between East and West Berlin at Friedrichstrasse. Checkpoint Charlie was the main access point for Allied personnel and Westerners to cross the border.

(Soon after the Berlin Wall was built, Checkpoint Charlie became an icon of the Cold War and was frequently featured in movies and books set during this time period.) Escape Attempts The Berlin Wall did prevent the majority of East Germans from emigrating to the West, but it did not prevent them all. During the history of the Berlin Wall, it is estimated that about 5,000 people made it safely across. Some early successful attempts were simple, like throwing a rope over the Berlin Wall and climbing up. Others were brash, like ramming a truck or bus into the Berlin Wall and making a run for it. Still others were suicidal, like jumping from the not-yet-boarded-up, upper-story windows of apartment buildings that bordered the Berlin Wall. As the Berlin Wall became stronger and larger, the escape attempts became more planned and more complex. Some people dug tunnels from the basements of buildings in East Berlin, under the Berlin Wall, and into West Berlin. Another group saved scraps of cloth and built a hot air balloon and flew over the Wall. Unfortunately, not all escape attempts were successful.

Since the East German guards were allowed to shoot anyone nearing the eastern side of the Berlin Wall without warning, there was always a chance of death in any and all escape plots. It is estimated that somewhere between 100 and 200 East Germans died while attempting to cross the Berlin Wall. One of the most infamous cases of a failed attempt occurred on August 17, 1962. In the early afternoon, two 18-year-old young men ran toward the Wall with the intention on scaling it. The first of the young men to reach the Berlin Wall successfully scaled it. The second one, Peter Fechter , was not so lucky. As he was about to scale the Wall, a border guard opened fire. Peter continued to climb the Wall, but ran out of energy just as he reached the top. He then tumbled back onto the East German side of the Berlin Wall. To the shock of the world, Peter was just left there. The East German guards did not shoot him again nor did they go to his aid. Peter shouted in agony for nearly an hour. Once he had bled to death, East German guards carried off his body.

He became the 50th person to die at the Berlin Wall and a symbol of the struggle for freedom. The Fall of the Berlin Wall The fall of the Berlin Wall happened nearly as suddenly as its rise. There had been signs that the Communist bloc was weakening, but the East German Communist leaders insisted that East Germany just needed a moderate change rather than a drastic revolution. East German citizens did not agree. As Communism began to falter in Poland, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia in 1988 and 1989, new exodus points were opened to East Germans who wanted to flee to the West. Then suddenly, on the evening of November 9, 1989, an announcement made by East German government official Günter Schabowski blundered by stating, "Permanent relocations can be done through all border checkpoints between the GDR (East Germany) into the FRG (West Germany) or West Berlin." People were in shock. Were the borders really open? East Germans tentatively approached the border and indeed found that the border guards were letting people cross. Very quickly, the Berlin Wall was inundated with people from both sides.

Some began chipping at the Berlin Wall with hammers and chisels. There was an impromptu huge celebration along the Berlin Wall, with people hugging, kissing, singing, cheering, and crying. The Berlin Wall was eventually chipped away, into smaller pieces (some the size of a coin and others in big slabs). The pieces have become collectibles and are stored in both homes and museums. There is also now a Berlin Wall Memorial at the site. Cold War Museum Berlin Time Line: 1945 - 1990 Berlin Wall Time Line Starts August 1961 May 1945 The Red Army captures Berlin and with the end of World War II, on May 8, 1945, Berlin is divided into four sectors: the American, British, and French the West; the Soviet in the East:. June 30, 1946 The demarcation line between East and West Germany is safeguarded at the instigation of the Soviet Military administration. October 29, 1946 A 30 day valid Interzonenpass or Inter-zone passport is required to travel between the sectors in Germany.

It was still possible to cross between the two sectors, although it was becoming increasingly dangerous. June 23, 1948 Currency reform in Berlin, Berlin is divided into two different currency zones. June 24, 1948 The Soviet Union begins the Berlin blockade. June 25, 1948 The United States begins the Berlin Airlift to keep Berlin supplied with food and fuel. April 4, 1949 The United States, Canada and Western European countries sign the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in Washington. May 12, 1949 End of the Berlin blockade. May 24, 1949 Founding of the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany). September 30, 1949 End of the Berlin Airlift. October 7, 1949 The German Democratic Republic (East Germany) is proclaimed in East Berlin. April 1, 1952 East German leaders meet with Stalin in Moscow.

At the meeting Stalin’s foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov proposes that the East Germans should “introduce a system of passes for visits of West Berlin residents to the territory of East Berlin [so as to stop] free movement of Western agents” in the GDR. May 26, 1952 Border between East and West Germany and between East Germany and West Berlin is closed. Only the border between East and West Berlin is still opened. June 17, 1953 Riots by East Berlin building workers against the working conditions are suppressed by the Red Army. November 14, 1953 The Western Powers waive the Interzonenpass, the Soviet Union follows but East German citizen need a permission to travel to the West. December 11, 1957 Leaving East Germany without permission is forbidden and violations are prosecuted with prison up to three years. November 30, 1960 Meeting between Nikita Khrushchev and Walter Ulbricht. “We must create the conditions so that the GDR economy will not be vulnerable to our enemies. We didn’t know that the GDR was so vulnerable to West Germany.

This is not good; we must correct this now.” (W. Ulbricht) June 15, 1961 First Secretary of the Socialist Unity Party of the GDR and Staatsrat chairman Walter Ulbricht states at an international press conference: “Niemand hat die Absicht, eine Mauer zu errichten!” (No one has the intention to erect a wall). It was the first time the colloquial term Mauer (wall) was used in this context. July 25, 1961 President John F. Kennedy gives a speech just days before the border between East and West Berlin is closed. He stresses the need for NATO countries to hold onto West Berlin and says any Soviet attack on Berlin would be equivalent to an attack on NATO. “Those who threaten to unleash the forces of war on a dispute over West Berlin should recall the words of the ancient philosopher: ’A man who causes fear cannot be free from fear.” (John F. Kennedy) August 4, 1961 Nikita Khrushchev reacts to President Kennedy’s speech to the leaders of the Warsaw Treaty Organization.

Khrushchev was preparing to seal the borders of East Berlin with a concrete wall, but the plan was kept top secret. The speech betrays Khrushchev’s concern with the new Kennedy government and the possibility of a war beginning with confrontation in Berlin — and possibly ending in nuclear destruction. “You convinced yourself that Khrushchev will never go to war ... so you scare us [expecting] us to retreat. True, we will not declare war, but we will not withdraw either...” (Nikita S. Khrushchev) Berlin Wall Time Line August 13, 1961 The Berlin border between East and West Berlin is closed. The zonal boundary is sealed in the morning by East German troops. “Shock workers” from East Germany and Russia a seal off the border with barrier of barbed wire and light fencing that eventually became a complex series of wall, fortified fences, gun positions and watchtowers heavily guarded and patrolled. In the end, the Berlin Wall was 96 miles (155 km) long and the average height of the concrete wall was 11.8 ft (3.60 m).

Over the course of the Wall’s existence, 133 people were confirmed killed trying to cross into West Berlin according to official sources, while a victims’ group puts the number at over 200 dead. There were also some 5,000 successful escapes into West Berlin. The August 13 operation lasted 24 hours. August 14, 1961 Brandenburg Gate is closed. August 15, 1961 Conrad Schumann, the first East German border guard, escapes by jumping the barbed wire to West Berlin. The first concrete elements and large square blocks are used on this date. Within the next months the first generation of the Berlin Wall was build up: a wall consisting of concrete elements and square blocks. August 16th, 1961 The barbed wire barrier is being removed and replaced with a wall of concrete blocks. This first Wall around Berlin was two meters high, made from different building materials assembled into a rough construction. August 26, 1961 All crossing points are closed for West Berlin citizens. June 1962 A second Wall is being built to prevent escapes to the West.

The first Wall is improved over the next years and it becomes difficult to distinguish between the first and the second generations of the Wall. August 17, 1962 Peter Fechter, 18, a bricklayer from East Berlin, is shot and left to bleed to death in full view of western media. Bystanders in the West tried to rescue him, but were prevented from it at gunpoint. June 26, 1963 President J. F. Kennedy visits Berlin and declares: “Ich bin ein Berliner.” (“I am a Berliner.”) December 17, 1963 After 7 rounds of negotiations between the Senate of Berlin and the East German authorities, an administrative agreement is signed allowing West Berliners to visit their relatives in East Berlin on a limited basis. 1965 A new Wall generation, the third, is introduced to replace the old construction. The new one consists of concrete slabs laid between H-shaped steel concrete supports. A round, 0,40 meter large concrete tube capped the wall making it more difficult to climb over. September 3, 1971 The Four Power Agreement over Berlin is reached.

It charges the governments of West Berlin and the GDR with negotiating an accord that would regulate access to and from West Berlin from the FRG and secure the right of West Berliners to visit East Berlin and the GDR. May 1972 The Transit Agreement is reached that arranged the matters raised in the Four Power Agreement and also secured the rights of GDR citizens to visit the FRG, but only in cases of family emergency. December 1972 The Basic Treaty is signed in which both German states committed themselves to developing normal relations on the basis of equality, guaranteeing their mutual territorial integrity as well as the border between them, and recognizing each other’s independence and sovereignty. They also agreed to the exchange of “permanent missions” in Bonn and East Berlin to further relations. May 1973 East and West Germany establish formal diplomatic ties. October 1, 1973 An explicit firing order is issued to a special team of Stasi agents tasked with infiltrating regular units of border guards to prevent their colleagues from defecting. “It is your duty to use your combat ... skills in such a way as to overcome the cunning of the border breacher, to challenge or liquidate him in order to thwart the planned border breach.

... Don’t hesitate to use your weapon even when border breaches happen with women and children, which traitors have often exploited in the past.” 1975-1976 Construction of the infamous ‘Stutzwandelement UL 12.11’, known also as Grenzmauer 75 (Border Wall ’75) begins. This new installation — a second wall — penetrated deeper into East German territory and included a touch-sensitive, self-firing fence. The product of a large-scale development and testing program, it was made of L-shaped sections of pre-cast concrete used by farmers to build open silos. Each section was 3.60 meters high and 1.20 meters wide and was topped off by a smooth asbestos-concrete pipe 40 centimeters in diameter. Consequently, the Wall becomes harder to penetrate. Yet this did not put an end to attempted escapes. As a result, East German authorities increase their control of the border structures. June 12, 1987 President Ronald Reagan visits Berlin and calls on Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev to tear down the Berlin Wall.

February 6, 1989 Chris Gueffroy is the last person to be killed trying to cross the Wall. August 23, 1989 Communist Hungary removes its border restrictions with Austria. September 10, 1989 The Hungarian government opens border for East German refugees More than 13,000 East Germans escape into Austria. November 4, 1989 An estimated one million people attend a pro-democracy demonstration in East Berlin’s main square. Within days, the East German Government resigns. November 9, 1989 The East German government announces that visits in West Germany and West Berlin will be permitted. Thousands of East Berliners pass into West Berlin as border guards stand by. People begin tearing down the wall which is opened. December 22, 1989 The Brandenburg Gate is opened. October 3, 1990 Researched by museum volunteer Etienne Huygens. For additional information click here .

Question: In which year was construction of the Berlin Wall started?
Answer: 1961